Christopher Erdman, University of California, Santa Barbara
An influential interpretation of Roman assemblies holds that voters approved essentially any proposal put before them (Mouritsen; Flaig). This implies that voters’ decision-making role was illusory and largely predetermined. However, this view is contradicted by several considerations, including the role of political theater at the assembly itself. I argue that highly controversial and dramatic elite behavior during lawmaking assemblies, especially blatant obstructionism, largely functioned as political theater meant to express dissent, manufacture controversy, or even incite violence rather than necessarily to halt voting on a proposal. Politicians expected voters to recognize irregularities at the assembly and to understand the unstated meaning of their performance (see e.g. Austin; Butler), which calls into question the idea that Roman voters were uninterested in the lawmaking procedure and paid little attention during voting.
Recent research suggests that contrary to the traditional view that the tribunes were obliged to obey their colleagues’ vetoes, regardless of public opinion, obstructing legislation at assemblies was ineffective at preventing voting on a law (Morstein-Marx 2021, contra de Libero). Indeed, Cicero even argued successfully in court that the tribunician veto was illegitimate when used against the assembly’s right to choose the laws and when arrayed against the self-evident popular will (Cic., Corn., F31; cf. Plut., Ti. Gracc., 15.2-6). Yet Roman politicians repeatedly obstructed legislative assemblies despite the nearly nonexistent success rate and even when alternate tactics (e.g. vetoing proposals in the senate) could be more effective. The evidence suggests that rather than expecting promulgating magistrates to give up in the face of obstruction, politicians used the visibility of obstructing the assembly to signal tacitly that their views were being suppressed (Dio, 36.24.5-36a; Plut., Pomp., 25.6), to provoke violence and disorder that in rare cases could disrupt assemblies (Plut., Cat. Min., 26.3-29.2; Dio, 37.43), or to present themselves as martyrs unjustly crushed by “tyrants” (App., BC, 2.11). Popular pressure forced magistrates to treat obstructionism as illegitimate, which allowed obstructers to maneuver their opponents into compromising positions, while the outrage of voters at being obstructed sometimes allowed obstructers to “steal the show” even from overwhelmingly popular leaders. This form of political theater was largely aimed at long-term results, damaging the popularity of promulgating magistrates or rehabilitating the opposition, rather than being directed at the nearly hopeless short-term goal of blocking a highly popular proposal.
This indicates that voters were active participants in lawmaking who expected elites to conform to their expectations of correct behavior, especially deference to the voting power of the people, rather than vice versa. That elites perceived as illegitimately obstructing the people were shouted down, driven away by violence, or even prevented from approaching the forum at all fits well with recent interpretations of Republican politics as significantly more open and interactive than often thought (Morstein-Marx 2004; Yakobson; Rosillo-López; Russell): to voters, the magistrates were servants, not masters. Forms of political theater were an integral part of political communication and interactivity in antiquity, by which both elites and voters attempted to exercise their agency.